The Eluktronics MAG-15 is the industry's lightest 15.6-inch gaming laptop! This 15.6-inch notebook is made of magnesium alloy which is lighter and stronger than aluminum and weighs only 4.15 lbs. This laptop was developed in cooperation with Intel and is the perfect solution for players and creators. Long battery life, Thunderbolt 3, premium new generation wireless headphones, touch screen, please check! While reading, you will find that this laptop will check every possible need in everyone's list!
A sturdy and well-designed notebook with some flaws
I ordered MSI GS65 Stealth two weeks before listening to and buying this laptop, so I'm going to take a look at this laptop and compare it. In terms of hardware and performance, the MAG-15 is almost superior to the GS65 in every respect. Aesthetically and in terms of the overall quality of the building, its meaning is more complex. From a price point of view, the MAG-15 is definitely the winner.
These things are the same:
Both devices are equipped with i7-9750H, RTX 2070 Max-Q, 32 GB DDR4, NVMe 1 TB, 15 "IPS 1920x1080 and it weighs less than 2 kg.
Various things:
* Display *
The GS65 offer is excellent. It has a 240Hz refresh rate on the MAG-15 144Hz card. Both are soft butter and most people will not notice the difference. The real problem with MAG-15 is the strange backlight leakage between pixels. It can only be seen in certain spot colors (especially blue) and appears as subtle white lines between individual pixels. It doesn't matter, but it hurts the experience and disappointes it considering the outstanding performance of the machine.
* keyboard *
The keyboard of the GS65 liked it. Very good, I have nothing to complain about. MAG-15 keyboard is completely different. I personally like it, but others may not like it. It's easy to use, the laptop keyboard is easy to move and write is very satisfying. I have no recommendation from the other side.
Trackpad
The GS65 trackpad is excellent. The texture may be more embarrassing and you may or may not like it. The trackpad of MAG-15 is not connected properly, so the trackpad does not rotate completely when clicked. As with the screen, it's not a big deal, but it looks really cheap and not on this device. It does not look as accurate as the GS65 trackpad.
* The overall quality of the building *
MAG-15 has excellent build quality. It is difficult to quantify, but if you take it out of the bag and touch it, it appears to be stronger. The production of the GS65 is not bad, but it does not raise the confidence of people like MAG-15. The MAG-15 case is made almost exclusively of magnesium alloy. GS65 is a combination of aluminum (I think) and plastic on the back edge.
* Aesthetics *
Both are clean and professional and are not used in Board meetings. The GS65 is more attractive with golden edges, while the MAG-15 is boring black, except for the logo (slightly deformed in typical). MAG-15 does not contain "RTX" tags, etc., unlike GS65.
* the size *
Both laptops are approximately the same width and thickness. The depth (front to back) of the MAG-15 is not as good as the GS65 depth. The difference is about 1 cm. MAG-15 performance is greater than GS65, but weight is almost equal.
* Promotion *
MAG-15 is much better here. Motherboard above GS65 (RAM and keyboard-side memory), and upgrade allows higher sharing than most other laptops (including MAG-15). It takes about 5 minutes or 30 minutes for the SSD to install the memory to reduce the risk of damage.
* WIFI *
MAG-15 is better. It comes with Wi-Fi 6 (ax); GS65 still uses the old AC standard.
* the battery *
MAG-15 is better. It comes with a battery of 94 hours. GS65 comes with an 80 hour battery.
* I / o *
It's different: unlike the MAG-15, the GS65 has a small display port. MAG-15 was developed for Thunderbolt 3. GS65 also includes TB3, but it doesn't seem to support simultaneous operation of two devices. The TB3 port of MAG-15 is valid. MAG-15 also includes an SD Card Reader. GS65 does not work. The port location on the MAG-15 is much better than the port location on the GS65. The GS65 has a power adapter and all video ports on the right. Power is not a problem, as both devices use connectors in the right corner. However, if you use your right hand, most of the video wires interfere with the use of the mouse on the GS65. MAG-15 puts power adapter, TB3, HDMI 2.0 and Ethernet in the back.
After a week's use, there are other suggestions: When the front light bar turns off, there is no light on the outside of the device. If you find flashing LED lights that bother anyone like me, you will be grateful. Although charging is confirmed, you do not need to open the cap.
The box contains Intel or RTX tags.
The trackpad appears to be firmly connected next to the keyboard and pointing to the user. As a result, the user page hovers slightly above the mechanical left / right click button. As mentioned above, this is not a bad experience, although it does have certain habits, it is much less than the GS65.
Display - I didn't really notice that the backlight between pixels would be lost in daily use.
Battery-I ran Chrome, Python, Webserver, Slack, Outlook, and Spotify for about 6.5 hours while all three performance parameters were mixed.
Keyboard - I think strong typing (like me) finds the keyboard better than light typewriters. As mentioned by another reviewer, you will sometimes think when pressing a key that was recorded but not registered.
MAG-15 (and GS65) wireless display supports Windows wireless display.
MAG-15 start / stop time is very bad. I don't know why, but it takes about 20 seconds to get started, and about 10 seconds to open the cover to wake up. I am trying to install Windows on a different SSD (Samsung 970 EVO). I had no time on the GS65, but the start time was about three times and I could wake up almost immediately. If you are someone who whipped your laptop, get ready to work directly for a few minutes and repeat it all day.
Speaking of reinstalling Windows, this is very normal. Eluktronics provides all drivers and utilities on its website. (You can not always count on the Windows Driver Installer in all cases.) Also, the laptop does not ship with outdated software. I usually install Windows clean on every new computer I buy to remove spam from OEM install. In this case, however, I do not have to do this.
Features
- Developed in conjunction with Intel, it is made of magnesium alloy and is the lightest 15.6-inch gaming notebook in the industry!
- 9th Generation Intel Core i7-9750H (up to 4.5GHz); Windows 10 Home 64-bit (reinstall without bloatware)
- 6GB GDDR6 VRAM NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti; 32GB DDR4 1 TB PCIe NVMe SSD
- 144Hz IPS refresh rate (1920 x 1080), 14Hz Backlight IPS display; Thunderbolt 3, HDMI 2.0b
- Mechanical keyboard with brown switch. Intel Wi-Fi 6; precisely touch screen. 6-cell battery life